I hope everyone here on the East Coast weathered Hurricane Irene well this past weekend, and for anyone who may have sustained property damage or other negative consequences of the storm, I would encourage you to avail yourself of the many local, state and government resources at your disposal. I'd also like to thank and acknowledge our staff and facility teams for their efforts in preparations that minimized risk and impact to our people and our facilities. As a result, the majority of NOAA’s Fisheries facilities along the East Coast are operating today with some power outages and damage to our facilities in North Carolina, New Jersey, Connecticut and Rhode Island. We are working to bring all the facilities back up to full service as soon as possible.

As East Coast communities begin the task of cleaning up and recovering from Hurricane Irene, NOAA Fisheries is reaching out to state and community leaders to assess effects of the storm, including the impact of coastal and river flooding on commercial and recreational fishing communities. NOAA’s storm forecasts and the cooperation between federal, state and local leaders helped protect lives, property and livelihoods as Americans up and down the coast prepared for Irene in the days and hours before its landfall. This high level of cooperation is continuing as we assess the effects and work together to restore coastal communities, ports and commerce. NOAA planes, ships and navigation teams are surveying our ports and harbors for navigational hazards and NOAA’s National Weather Service continues to alert communities of flooding along the coast and inland.

We will keep you posted on any updates to the assessment and recovery efforts, but thanks to all for your support and commitment to our mission through this historic weather event.